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Broody Guinea Fowl

In the four years I have been keeping and raising guinea fowl I have never seen a guinea hen go broody and then this Spring 3 of the guinea fowl have gone broody.

It has been interesting to observe that the guinea fowl hens don’t wait till there is a large clutch of eggs they are happy to sit on just 3 or 4 eggs. Unfortunately most of the time the guinea fowl have been sitting on pot eggs which I place in the guinea fowl nests to encourage the hens to continue to lay there. Guinea fowl like to lay their eggs on the ground in the undergrowth and it can sometimes be difficult to find their nests, so once you have found them, it is important to encourage them to lay their for as long as possible.

I was hoping to get some of my guinea fowl hens to sit on their eggs this year as it is difficult to get a good hatch rate when guinea fowl eggs are in the incubator (well at least that is the case for me!) Unfortunately the guinea hens have chosen unsuitable sites that would have left them vulnerable to predators and I won’t let a fox come and take my guinea fowl if I can help it, especially not for the sake of 2 pot eggs and one guinea egg! The 3 guineas have gone broody at the base of a tree which made trying to put the run over her very difficult, another in a neighbour’s field 9I don’t think they would have appreciated cutting the grass around my guinea run!) and one in the middle of a wood pile (where no run would fit over it!).

It has been interesting trying to move the guinea fowl. They are not easily scared away from the nest and if you try to move them with a stick or your foot, it is soon attacked by a hissing guinea fowl beak! Once I managed to move the guinea fowl, they don’t immediately start running off. As I have observed them, I have noticed that they are in a trance like state and soon return to the nest or settle near it with their wings stretched out to cover the eggs. Even when I have managed to move the guinea fowl away from the nest she will sometimes try to run back to it until she comes out of the trance like state. The guinea fowl that sat in the neighbours field kept me fit one night running out of the field and around our yeard and then back to the field. By the time I come in after putting the guinea fowl safely in their hut at night, I am shattered!

I will continue to try to find a broody guinea fowl that has positioned herself on a nest that can have a run placed over her for protection, but in the meantime I have an incubator full of guinea fowl eggs.

Do you have any funny stories relating to broody guinea fowl or broody hens?

If you keep guinea fowl and want to ask a question to get some advice or just to chat about your guinea fowl then why not join the free farmingfriends guinea fowl forum.